The present invention relates to water treatment in general, and, in particular, to a reclamation process particularly for use in laundry facilities for the removal of solids from laundry wash water.
In many areas of the country the cost of water and its availability makes it necessary to conserve this resource as much as possible. In addition, sewage facilities are often overtaxed. Accordingly, it is becoming the practice to recycle or reclaim water for reuse.
Commercial laundries use a considerable amount of water. This water becomes dirty because of solid soil from the wash. For water reclamation in such facilities, it is necessary to effectively and economically remove a significant amount of the solids from raw wash water.
Solids can be removed from laundry water in flotation cells. In a cell, solids agglomerate with a flocculating agent and the agglomerates attach to air bubbles. The agglomerates are removed, say, by skimming. Solids can also be removed in a filter which traps the solids and separates them from laundry water. One problem with these removal techniques is that each requires a uniform rate of dirty water input for optimum performance and the dirty water is not generated at the same rate or uniformity. Moreover, and compounding the problem, is the requirement that treated water be available for laundry usage. While the conservation of water is itself laudable, the purity of any water discharged to sewage can also be important.
Additives for water conditioning are often required and these should be put into the reclamation system where good mixing occurs. The flotation cell supply of air bubbles traditionally comes from a pressure reduction of air tending to come out of solution as pressure is lowered.